Google Lets Searchers Show 11 Search Ads On Top

Nov 5, 2010 at 5:07pm ET by Barry Schwartz

A reader emailed me screen shots of Google testing AdWords top ads that can expand to eight additional ads. When expanded, you see a total of 11 ads, followed by the free organic Google search results.

Here are screen shots:

And when you expand them, they push the free listings down. Here is a cropped image showing some of the top ads expanded:

Related Topics: Channel: SEM | Google: AdWords | Top News

About The Author: Barry Schwartz is Search Engine Land's News Editor and owns RustyBrick, a NY based web consulting firm. He also runs Search Engine Roundtable, a popular search blog on very advanced SEM topics. Barry's personal blog is named Cartoon Barry and he can be followed on Twitter here. For more background information on Barry, see his full bio over here. See more articles by Barry Schwartz

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http://www.planetc1.com/ chiropractic

Wow, that’s a lot of ads on the expanded view. Didn’t duplicate on same search here. Will be watching for it.
http://www.sycara.com fdhill

Oh Oh is SEO dead yet
http://www.ppcforhire.com jonclark

I actually blogged about this earlier today – looks like they are testing multiple drop down numbers – http://www.ppcforhire.com/blog/2010/11/google-testing-drop-adwords-ads/ In this case there are 3 additional ads hidden beneath the drop down menu. Pretty interesting move on Google’s part although it would hard to argue it’s not purely monetary – the prices for top positioned ads will no doubt increase if advertisers want to maintain impression share.
http://www.tcampbell.net T Campbell

Oh, gosh, Google! THANK YOU SO MUCH for giving me the OPTION to watch eight more commercials before the movie starts!
http://www.affordableseofl.com seo_tampa

OMG – Google is going to get rid of the Organic SEO as a term? I really doubt that as this will only help Yahoo/Bing.
http://informabiz.com Mehmet Korukmez

Where would be the fourth position?
http://www.mikegroves.co.uk mikegroves

Not seen this in the UK yet. Is this testing in the US only?